With the news of the death of Verdades, Laura Graves’ dressage star, at age 23, we’re looking back to January 2015, when Graves was named the 2014 Dressage Horseman of the Year and the Dutch Warmblood gelding was named the Chronicle’s 2014 Dressage Horse of the Year after the pair were the top U.S. finishers at the Alltech World Equestrian Games in Normandy, France. This article first appeared in the Jan. 26 and Feb. 2, 2015, edition of the Chronicle.

Sometimes when you look at a weanling, you can imagine him accomplishing great feats in his future—competing at the FEI World Equestrian Games, maybe.

Sometimes you can’t.

“We were not even remotely pleased with him,” said Laura Graves of her first sighting of Verdades, whom she purchased from a video with the help of her mother, Patricia “Freddie” Graves, and then imported as a 6-month-old. “I think we were kind of shocked because it was our first time picking up a horse from quarantine. They’re leading out gorgeous warmblood after gorgeous warmblood, and my mom and I were thinking, ‘This one must be him. No, this one must be him!’ Then they brought out this one; he was covered in vinegar from being sanitized, and it took three people to manhandle this wild little foal. They called his name, and we were like, ‘I guess that one’s ours.’ ”

That wild little Dutch Warmblood foal (Florett AS—Liwilarda, Goya) would grow up—eventually—and become the top-placed U.S. horse at the 2014 Alltech FEI World Equestrian Games (France) this year.

But Verdades’ first few months in the United States didn’t make anyone think he’d later set the world on fire. He was sick after his journey, and because he hadn’t been handled much prior to import, the Graves family couldn’t treat him at their Vermont farm. He stayed at a veterinary hospital until he recovered. Once “Diddy” returned, he lived out with a group of horses, and Laura, just a teenager, worked with him after school.

“He was afraid of the saddle pad and the bridle, afraid of being taken from the barn,” she said. “He took off and broke probably five snaffle bridles, for no apparent reason. He’d be standing quietly, and then he’d panic and take off. But once I was riding him, he was still very sensitive, but he was always really kind.”

When the gelding was 4 or 5, Laura competed him at training level for the first time.

“He almost took the judge’s head off,” said Laura, 26. “He kicked so high at C that he left dirt on the judge’s table. I didn’t show him again until he was going about third level. There was no point.”

What made training level difficult for Diddy, namely his hot temperament and sensitivity, helped him excel as he moved up, to third level in 2010—around the time Laura moved from Vermont to Florida to work with Anne Gribbons—and to the small tour at CDIs in 2012.

Diddy won the open Intermediaire II at the U.S. Dressage Finals (Kentucky) in 2013, but the next step was a big one.

“My feeling was that I needed help. I’d done a lot of the Intermediaire II work myself. I had the one-tempis, and the pretend piaffe and passage,” Laura said. “You know, what you play with at home, and you think it’s piaffe and passage, and then you go to a show, and the judges are like, ‘Oh, that’s not a real piaffe and passage.’ Luckily I found that help.”

By the time Diddy was doing Grand Prix in early 2014, people were taking note of him—not everyone yet, but the right people, notably U.S. Dressage Chef d’Equipe Robert Dover and USEF Developing Coach Debbie McDonald, with whom Laura started training full time this year.

“I always knew the horse had an amazing ability,” said McDonald. “I said to her several times, ‘I think he’s honestly one of the most talented horses in the world as far as what he can do with his body.’ He’s almost a freak at certain things, and yet, with her on him, he’s a pretty cool competitor. They have a longstanding relationship, and he has one hundred percent trust in her.”

Diddy’s Grand Prix work was developing throughout the season, and when they left for the U.S. Dressage Festival of Champions in Gladstone, New Jersey, as one of the last pairs qualified, Laura and her horse had only once scored above 70% in a CDI Grand Prix test, and that was a freestyle. But they earned a spot on the U.S. Team after taking the national reserve title.

“I didn’t think it was possible at all,” Laura said. “I knew we had to bust our butts to be in the top eight. But when I looked around, I said, ‘I have a great horse.’ ”

In France, Laura relied on her hard-earned knowledge of her mount—allowing him to walk all the way around the outside of the arena, only picking up a canter right before entering at A—and the dressage world noticed him in a big way. A few people weren’t shocked by Diddy’s fifth-placed finish in the Grand Prix freestyle at the World Games—and one of those was sitting on him. Laura had felt him improving through all the years of training and months of fine-tuning.

“My horse stepped up to the plate,” Laura said. “These things pay off. I know if I’d pushed him two years ago, it would have blown his mind. Someone greater than all of us had this planned. There was no way these things could have just come together like that.”

Laura isn’t sure what 2015 holds for Diddy—maybe the Pan American Games in Toronto, most likely some CDIs, and she’s aiming for that elusive 80% in the Grand Prix. She’s also facing a new challenge, one she never expected based on her first meeting with Diddy more than a decade ago.

“Before we went to Gladstone, I was sitting with Debbie, and she said, ‘I want you to be prepared. There will be people offering you large amounts of money for this horse,’ ” said Laura. “I said, ‘I don’t even want to know what kind of numbers.’

“I’ve still never heard a number,” she added. “There is not an amount of money that would fill the hole in my heart if this horse were gone.”